Call me Ishmael

7.05.2007

Or something like that. Griff and I wrote this on a 36 hour bus ride a week ago. The bus had a little cold problem and well, smelled. We got a little weird.

Dear Loved Ones-
It is the seventeenth hour of our journey, and I do not know how much longer I will be able to write you. The hysteria accompanying hypothermia has set, and in the row in front of me the wind howls and the snow blows. Outside, the air is hot and the sun is shining. So close to paradise. Alas, I may freeze in this 18 wheeled icy tomb. Damn you cruel fate!

Sir Griff and I have commenced a 36 hour quest to Belem from Salvador. We intend to explore the Amazon's great beauty at whatever the cost. For shame, we may have to do this minus a few fingers and toes.

One would think that if all of the tour guide books warn against the cold on the bus, and if all of the Brazilians brought heavy blankets, that someone would just turn the blasted air conditioner down. Griff and I have launched a covert mission to do this very thing at our next stop. The stakes are high. We may get thrown off the bus. Worse yet, they may make us strip naked and stand in this barren wasteland.

It is winter here, most of the Brazilians I have talked to find the weather outside cold, so there is no way they are comfortable in here. I am now wearing a dress, a pair of Griffin's pants, one of my shirts and one of his shirts. I resemble a rap star without the bling. Still, I had to curl into a ball to sleep tonight. Soon we will burning our passports to keep warm.

I am losing all touch with reality. Hour by hour it erodes. Inside my head echo the words: "The wheels on the bus go round and round, round and round, round and round." Good God woman! Get a hold of yourself!

Griffin is a little jumpy still. The near death experience has not treated him well. I am afraid he will never be the same. The noxious gasses seem to be getting to him.

We may not have rationed our food well. "For what, Sam?" "For the trip home, Mr. Frodo." "Sam, there will not be a trip home."

There are 18 hours left in our journey. It seems we shall never get there mostly because there are speed bumps in the middle of nowhere and our bus stops every 15 minutes. Not to do anything, mind you. It just pulls of the road, sits there, and then begins to drive again.

Griff and I have started talking to ourselves and speaking in British accents. We laugh at the slightest provocation. For example, we found this post very funny.